Window Dressing
Posted on
May 11, 2024 by
Chris Cairns
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Wings Over ScotlandA tall tale
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Transphobia
A vague cartoon.
Exactly. Thanks Chris for lancing the putrid boil.
Who’s In charge? The man with the most money. ?
duncanio
Ignored says:
11 May, 2024 at 7:15 am
A vague cartoon.
Just coz the windows have been redacted.
If Dishonest John could keep going as a High Street shopkeeper, he’d actually be doing pretty well in an ear of retail parks and online ordering. I reckon Kate’s handbag is intended as a wee Thatcher reference.
Aye, minding the colonial shop for our owner. Its aw just a ‘front’ tae keep the racket going. A few puppets in the windaes, keeps the bairns amuised. Undertaker on the side, Chris?
Please Kate, don’t just don’t be window dressing. You were nearly leader a year ago. Effect real change.
I was thinking when I heard the earnest speech by Kate Forbes that the SNP are very desperate and must keep the Greens on side.
I didn’t vote for the Harvie/Slater party and never will.
I don’t want children taught dangerous, unscientific crap in schools.
Please Kate, don’t just be window dressing. You were nearly leader a year ago. Effect real change.
So if Forbes is playing G’G’G’Granville to Swinney’s Arkwright, who gets to play Nurse Gladys Emmanuel?
Answers on a postcard to…
LOL! Change the word “Cabinet” for Casket. He is definitely the kiss of death. Hooray!
He’s only in position to “justify” another later change of leader back to Sturgeon once all the legal stuff subsides.
Window dressing, that is exactly what Kate Forbes is being used as here.
Shorn of any real power she is just plastered over the face of the rancid old Sturgeon regime that refuses to die or relinquish power.
I don’t why she is doing this, she is being used, and by the time it is over she will be despised same as them. She will have squandered her political capital on John Swinney.
Kate Forbes seems a bit dumb, bland, a team player when the team is rotten. She seems to lack courage just goes along with everything. As I heard it described recently she is a ‘go along, get along’ type of gal.
I can already sense the beginnings of me not liking her… it really did not take long. Every time I see he propping up Sweatpants Swinney it grows a little more…
Ash Regan much more reminds me of Salmond. She is much braver than Forbes, and IMHO much more principled and strategically minded.
THE SPECTATOR.
«Scottish First Minister John Swinney remains committed to the gender recognition legislation blocked by the UK government. His deputy Kate Forbes said she would ‘wholeheartedly endorse’ the Scottish government’s position – despite previously saying she had ‘significant concerns’ about the legislation»
DR SAMUEL JOHNSON
«The impudence of an Irishman is the impudence of a fly, that buzzes about you, and you put it away, but it returns again, and flutters and teazes you. The impudence of a Scotsman is the impudence of a leech, that fixes and sucks your blood»
There are legions of useless men cavorting in contemporary Scottish politics and the distaff element is evidently no improvement.
Dr Johnson also opined that those who go to Scotland discover a worse kind of England…the Hebrides excepted.
Who made Yousless resign?
Who installed Swinney as leader, despite KF being clearly the next in line given she supposedly narrowly lost to Yousless?
Yousless’ feet barely touched the ground and Sweatpants Swinney, the shitelest choice of leader imaginable, inexplicably gets handed the gig unopposed… you fucking what!?
So who is doing all this?
It is clearly Sturgeon.
Yousless was her puppet, until he started getting uppity and thinking he really was in charge and then he was INSTANTLY replaced with a Sturgeon drone that is guaranteed 100% loyal to Sturgeon.
That is why Swinney bizarrely got the gig and Forbes was sidelined. Forbes is too dangerous for them.
They don’t give a fuck about Sweatpants being a good leader or a competent one, his only credential is his slavish loyalty to Sturgeon.
And Kate Forbes goes along with it… I am staring to wonder if she is a bit thick.
Team Sturgeon thought they could control Yousless as FM and for 99.9% of his time FM they were right. But as soon as he showed the first sign of not being under their control (by talking to ALBA) he was gone. Instantly.
Swinney however is fully under control, as he is as deeply involved in the corruption and betrayal of the SNP as Sturgeon and Murrell. And this is what they really mean by ‘a safe pair of hands’.
He is ‘up to his neck in it, same as them’ is what it really means.
Obviously Forbes should have got the job but they could not take any chance of her doing something they did not approve of. So they pick Swinney despite him being an appalling choice of leader (on the face of it) and then get Kate Forbes to stand next to him in a pretty dress smiling…
And people are actually buying this horseshit. I suppose I should not be surprised… they bought Sturgeon for 10 years. Mugs.
Mac says:
11 May, 2024 at 8:24 am
Individuals and the media makes a lot about her religion. She deals with this by saying she is a cabinet minister and is abides by the principle of collective responsibility.
That is a smart political move as it easily shuts down her critics. However, from a different perspective, it shows as you say she is ‘go along, get along’ type of gal.
If she is willing to compromise her personal beliefs in order to gain political power then what else is she going to compromise? It is hardly surprising she is mocked as Greenports Forbes.
She would have got a bit more respect if she defended her beliefs but said she would reconcile them with the need to be part of a government of a modern, secular country that has many other forms of beliefs, which includes her own.
In doing that though, there was be times that legislation would be introduced that goes against her beliefs and would have to vote on them according to her conscience which given the SNP’s so called ‘Progressive agenda’, she would be voting against them constantly if she genuinely wanted to defend her beliefs.
That isn’t going to happen as Greenports Forbes is only interested in furthering her own political ambitions and do anything to achieve that, even go against her own personal beliefs, if need be.
John Swinney was Acting Finance and Economy Secretary in addition to his position of Covid Recovery Secretary from July 2022 to March 2023.
Kate Forbes was Cabinet Secretary for Finance and the Economy from 2020 to 2023.
How much influence did they both have on the way the Scotwind
AuctionGiveaway was administered?If Scotland has even a chance of gaining Independence somebody has to be able to reconcile the angry, bitter, deluded nutters on ‘Wings’ with the deluded, angry, bitter nutters on WGD AND convince soft NO voters to switch AND form an honest, competent Government.
Can anyone see who that could be?
What do we want-INDEPENDENCE
When do we want it-NOW
What happens after that-FUCK KNOWS-WE DON’T CARE
An appropriate cartoon, as usual, Chris.
The only things clear is that Ms Forbes is behind bars … a prisoner of the SNP Woke wing.
But she’s no daft she must realise she will be the leader if nothing worth having.
There is no getting round the fundamental criminal dishonesty of the Salmond conspiracy. The high heed yins in the snp are all involved by being actively part of it or being silent.
They have failed in everything but stupidity
Is Patrick Harvie still in charge.
And all this Yousaf/Cabinet nonsense just distraction.
With Humza’s speech about white CEOs is there a significance that all John’s boards are black!! 😉
Freeport Forbes.
Sigh. Trapped. Muzzled. Does Kate Forbes realise that sneaky Swinney has now got her exactly where he wants her? Effectively neutralised and forced to toe the party line. Did she walk blindfolded into this obvious set-up or is she a lot smarter than we thought?
I expect Mr Swinney is just waiting for the Heat Pump installers to arrive.
Forbes is not a prisoner of anything but her monthly salary.
I’m thinking I will check the bookies to see what odds I might get:
BoJo to return south of the border.
Sturgeon to return in Scotland.
Despite the torrents of abuse heaped on both here, out in the real world, they are both immensely popular still with their loyal supporters.
Both represent their party’s only hopes of thwarting Starmer.
As for Forbes, a decent, ordinary woman doing her best to survive miles out of her depth, just like all the other HR politicians who aren’t certifiable fruitloops, she will know that if the risen Jesus was appointed FM on Monday, this place would still be filled with carping posts.
Kate Forbes doesn’t convince me one bit. She reeks of someone who says “I’m a mother and I don’t have time for independence and this is a nice little part time job”.
Apart from a handful of individuals we don’t have people with the commitment, passion or brains to see this country through to independence.
Another cracker Chris.
Can anybody enlighten me about the appeal of Kate Forbes? Serious question. I genuinely don’t know what people see that I don’t.
Strikes me as mediocrity outshining the dismal, but maybe it’s my jaded perspective.
Freeports however are a huge klaxon for me. Danger! Danger! Wake up Scotland. If they can’t frack us one way they’ll do it another.
Swinney as FM is just Sturgeonism and continuity combined to keep the status quo intact, we’ll have two more years of gender issues the possible implementation of juryless trials, the handing over of what’s left of Scottish assets to big corporations, as think tanks and quangos make or help shape public policies, policies that will benefit not Scots but big business, KPMG already pays a huge part in this.
This will be combined with poor governance on important matters such as education, housing, the NHS, poverty, schools and infrastructure etc, because if these things are in a continuous state of failing which they have been since Sturgeon became FM and so forth, then people minds will be busy with just trying to make ends meet, and independence will be at the back of the queue, this I’m afraid was and still is the plan, govern so badly that people won’t have time or the inclination to vote for independence, of course under the SNP from Sturgeon onwards there was and will be no chance to vote for independence anyway.
Lets not waste anymore time on the SNP we’ve wasted a decade on their false promises, its time to move away from the SNP which is still controlled by the Old Guard as Yousaf’s unceremoniously sacking by Sturgeon and her Clique showed us.
Lets now vote for Alba or the ISP.
Which bring me to this.
“THE Alba Party’s strategy for Scottish independence going forward can be revealed exclusively by the National.
Ahead of a campaign conference, to be held on May 18, this paper has seen a motion which will be put to delegates asking them to confirm the party’s independence strategy.
If accepted, it will see the party aim to win Scottish independence by fighting every Westminster and Scottish General Election in the foreseeable future as a de facto referendum.
Alba said this will be calculated by combining all votes for parties standing for independence.
In the event of a Yes victory, Alba will look to apply domestic and international pressure to “fulfil the democratic wishes of the Scottish people”.
The pro-independence party stated their candidates at the forthcoming Westminster elections will promote this new strategy and plan for it to succeed at the 2026 Scottish General Election.
The party also plans to introduce an Independence Convention which will be a mix of attendees from Scotland’s elected representatives and the public.
The Alba Party’s campaign conference will be held in Lochelly, Fife, next Saturday, May 18.
The motion which will be proposed by the party’s national executive committee reads:
Conference notes that over the last ten years the SNP has failed to advance the cause of Scottish independence and that Alba is now the only party with an agreed electoral strategy for securing Scottish independence.”
“Alba believe:
1. That each and every national election should be fought seeking a popular mandate to begin independence negotiations. On achievement of a majority vote combining all parties standing on this platform we will mobilise domestic and international pressure to fulfil the democratic wishes of the Scottish people.
2. The bill to extend the powers of the Parliament to include the legislation for and negotiation of independence by a national referendum is part of this strategy as is an Independence Convention comprising Scotland’s elected representatives and civic Scotland. These initiatives are designed to call on the sovereign power of the Scottish people to realise our objective.
3. Alba candidates at the forthcoming Westminster elections will promote this strategy with a view of bringing it to fruition at the 2026 Scottish General Election.”
@McDuff 10:31
Too apathetic, too thick?
You said it. I’m just summarising your post.
Anyway, I don’t agree. I think the real problem with Scotland can be stated in two words.
Too feart.
RepublicOfScotland 10:42
Mark time for 2 years then.
I find it pays, when considering a time in the future, to think back the same time in the past, and consider how much things have changed since then. Ah, the good old days of May 2022. Can anybody remember how much better things were (especially prices and relative wages, and the international situation) then?
May 2026 is aeons away. Does anybody want to consider how much worse everything is going to be by then?
There’s a WM GE this year. The results of that are going to define and shape Scotland for the next 5 years. We need policies and real action from Alba now.
Breeks says:
11 May, 2024 at 10:35 am
She has a pretty face and knows all the trendy buzzwords and how to use them for the right occasions.
A dream come true for the media luvvies and that is they are hyping her up.
Breeks @ 10.35
Whilst Ms Forbes has little appeal to me, friends and relatives who do like her seem to find her appealing because they view her as one of the few SNP politicians with “conviction politics”. Many of them also admiring Ms Regan for the same reasons.
Many of these folk aren’t particularly politically or independence minded, nor do they share her religious views.
Perhaps it’s just that she presents as someone who has some absolutes in her political life and this novelty makes a pleasant change from so many career politicians whose theme song could well be, “Any way the wind blows”.
John H @9:41
I ought to study the detail presented by Iain Lawson more before opining but my first thought on Freeports (no tax to UK treasury from significant chunk of Scotland’s economy) is that, in absence of the negotiated settlement hitherto preferred, they could be a golden opportunity to blow the doors off – provided our steering committee doesn’t get carried away with its sexual fetishes – and out negotiated, by naval expertise in the genre, in consequence.
Needless to say that leaves me imagining a leather clad Kate side kicking through window with thigh length stilettos (after a bit of seals training herself) and being significantly less worried for the future either way.
Never forget. We’re polling at 45 per cent. It won’t take much to tip the balance. The flowers of Scotland were born to bloom seen!
We are the 45. United we stand together. For freedom. Let the Unionists laugh at us.
We need action on Independence. ASAP.
HELP US!
I’ll never vote SNP again. It’s dawning on me that we’re going to enter a period of 10 years unionist control.
But our identity never changes. I’m a proud Scottish man. A patriot that loves my country.
I despise the globalists. If I had my way. We’d be talking about the demographics of English settlers coming north. To steal our land and our resources.
We need liberation and freedom.
I guess the green dress is to signal that she is there only to deliver the unpopular “green” free ports.
You cannot support independence and at the same time facilitate the chopping off of your country in bits so it can be sold off to external interests while at the same time killing the entry of revenue from those areas in the form of tax.
I would not be surprised to see Forbes, once she chops Scotland to bits with her “green” freeports, defecting to the tories, which seems to be her natural political home.
Those “green” freeports come across as the SNP’s response to the burden placed on generations of Scots with labour’s PFI con: “I see your PFI con and raise you to the even bigger con of tax-free ports”.
The more I see Forbes prancing around with Mr Black Pen helping him to hold onto the handbrake of independence, the more I am convinced her candidacy to the leadership election was only to divide the fundamentalist pro-independence vote naturally going to Ms Regan.
In my eyes, her pro-independence credibility is completely over. At least we know and do not waste any more time wondering how things would be if she had won that leadership contest.
stuart mctavish
I live in the Falkirk area, and our local council signed us up to the Freeports, later admitting that they knew nothing about them. Neither government nor our council have been very forthcoming about what the Freeports are about. If they were so beneficial to the area I‘ve no doubt that they would be shouting about them from the rooftops.
There are rumours that they will behave almost like independent countries. With low wages for employees, and huge profits for the few. Also we in this area fear that they will be used as a back door to bringing in fracking. I haven’t heard anything good about them so far. But Kate Forbes was happy to sign them up. How much does she really know about them?
The whole Freeport concept reeks of colonial exploitation. Any nationalist politician supporting it is either a plant, bought and paid for, or just a complete idiot. Either way, not a good look.
Mia. Yes, I believe that Freeports are just another way of weakening Scotland’s economy.
A clever, hard-hitting, funny cartoon, which precisely hits the nail on the head. Holiday Boy has excelled. Today’s piece ranks with the ‘creme de la creme’ of political satirists. Bravo, maestro! Is Stu paying you enough? (And ‘no’, this is not HB’s mum or bank manager or cat).
Swinney is no Machiavelli but keeping his «enemy» close does have resonance.
Forbes ought to rain check all invitations to cozy wee late night suppers, you never who or what is doing the catering.
If only SNP politics were as edgy!
Go on , be a devil Katie, have thet lest snowball, it’s got your name on it.
Harry McHateface
Yes they are feart, so why are they in the SNP?
As I have said , none of them have shown an ounce of passion or commitment to independence. So tell me what intelligent and vote grabbing initiatives and polices have the meaningless MP/MSPs produced in the past ten years?
They simply don’t have the brains. Would you trust this lot in negotiations with the sharks in
In Westminster dealing with the intricacies and logistics of separation should the drugged pop of Scotland ever vote for independence.
Breeks says:
11 May, 2024 at 10:35 am
Can anybody enlighten me about the appeal of Kate Forbes?
She read out a budget statement put together by someone else rather well and she knows what a woman is. What else do you want?
If freeports are a backdoor to bring about fracking then they cannot get started soon enough, bring down the cost of gas and run CCGT when the wind is not blowing.
Imagine a country with cheap access to energy. The greatest route out of poverty ever attempted.
The Sun shines and warmth has returned to Scotland after long, long months in the cold, cold darkness (that’s not a euphemism for Scottish liberation from oppression – it’s just the weather and seasons).
Rejoice and take heart fellow ethnic and indigenous Scots. All will be well.
And remember tae that comeuppance is always a joy to behold on the faces of the comeupped. So we all have that to look forward to.
Good cartoon, Chris. As usual – it says everything that needs to be said in a single image.
In the dirty record today Swinney wants to wipe out child poverty in Scotland. Am I wrong in thinking that the SNP have been in power now for many years? This shite is fucking embarrassing and takes a brass neck like sturgeon has to come out with this. Peas in a pod.
I have met Forbes a couple of times and my impression was that she’s not very bright.
John H @ 11:45
Employment, 0% tax & behaving like independent countries?
Didn’t realise they were going to be that good but anything that results in a decent strip down of an extraordinarily corrupt Scandinavian model sounds good to me.
Did see something about compulsory purchase that raised an eyebrow (after the Mennie excitemment) but way you describe the rest of it, am now wondering if the relative secrecy you allude to means the Holyrood owned Calmac can somehow backdate its purchase of Grangemouth for £1 and qualify for a massive tax rebate in the process.
Every so often some tit comes in about fracking : it makes no sense (but it does)
– it is net energy negative
– it is an environmental disaster as you pump hydrofluoric acid and other shite into the groundwater
– it is insane to go fracking when you have tons of the highest quality crude to access
– the wells drop off sharply in production
– it is capital intensive, i.e. the industry is designed to allow the bankers to make lots of loans, make lots of fees
– if you think fracking will lead to any “low prices”, then you are the biggest fucking idiot and should be made a ward of state
Scotland has cheap energy, but we are in this defective political union which robs us. Robs us blind. We have loads of untouched oil and gas fields and far more electricity than we can use. We have no control over this, none.
As for freeports; let’s call them what they are – pirate havens, outside the law designed to suck revenue out of their host, which they leech upon.
Imagine a Scots billionaire buying up an old oil tanker to turn it into a shopping mall where you could buy anything at all, tax and duty free; he then parks it just outside english territorial waters, but easy access to all the lovely english people; how do you think the english govt would react to this MASSIVE DRAIN OF TAX REVENUE flowing out of the economy? They would go nuts, and be right to.
The biggest freeport of all is the city, which is a true pirate haven – the anglos began as pirates and remain so – an external sovereign state, which writes it own laws. It is the ultimate parasite and leech, and now wants to extend the model. All that freeport revenue will have to be processed through the city, mind.
I wrote a bit about the disaster in the waiting, nuclear plans of the UK; none of this will result in “cheap energy” because the pricing will be structured to lock in a guaranteed profit to the operators.
Any more bright ideas? – I suggest you fuck off to the comment section of the daily telegraph and take twatty macmainface, cavemen, etc with you.
If you are thinking of that great retort : what about GERS??
GER is that thing where :
the PEOPLE WHO ROBBED YOU tell you HOW POOR YOU ARE …
average GDP per capita of EFTA countries is at least twice that of the UK; raw GDP of Ireland (no oil), Norway (tons of oil), Switzerland (no oil, no seas) all about 3 times what ours is …
– we need to call in the fraud investigators, let’s phone Kroll Associates, get them on the case – look into 300 years of pillage. And maybe they will find the 600K indyref money for an hors d’oeuvre.
DO YOU WANT TO BE RICH or kept POOR by the most narcissistic, bad mannered, entitled, loud and arrogant people on earth? They aren’t even grateful, patronising at best.
Systems like bland. The global puppeteers love them
Maybe Forbes appeal is unthreatening mellowness.
Cries from the wings for continuity are about sailing on and not, for god’s sake, rocking the boat.
The SNP cannot hug the «safety» of the coast for ever. The choppy seas, the exciting seas where adventure, and the odd man overboard, begins may well be too venturesome for this crew.
England expects Scotland to stick with nursie.
Before looking at Fracking, have a thought to the pumped storage facility at Cruachan in Argyll & Bute.
Read about the proposed Coire Glas pumped hydro storage scheme at Loch Lochy, with a potential delivery of sufficient renewable electricity to supply the demands of some 3 million homes within 5 minutes of requirement for up to 24 hours.
In a country whose topography abounds in Bens, mountain ranges and Lochs Scotland is provided with abundant reserves of “storage facilities” for natural power generation.
That’s clever, Chris – “cabinet maker”. Ha ha. And all he did was add the green dummy to the existing woodwork.
https://thecommongreen.scot/2024/05/03/profit-extraction-makes-scotland-poorer/
As the SNPs’ Kate Forbes works hand in hand with the Tory governments Michael Gove to force freeports on Scots, it been revealed that Perth and Kinross council have been nagging the Transport Secretary to close down its harbour because its running at a loss, basically there’s not enough commercial vessels coming to the port.
In my opinion ports are an important part of a town or city, ways should be found of increasing the amount of vessels coming to the port rather than closing it down.
A cynical person would easily be led to think that it would be much cheaper for someone or business to snap up the port if it were closed and reopen it again to make a profit, such is the way in Scotland.
From WEF site.
«The World Economic Forum brings together government, businesses and civil society to improve the state of the world»
Founded in 1971, you can really see the difference it has made.
But the future is actually Chinese.
https://www.weforum.org/events/annual-meeting-of-the-new-champions-2024/
How many Putongua speakers in Swinney’s kist.
The Tory Press are all jubilant that the U.K. economy that has been trashed and re-trashed is now “Gangbusters”.
What has apparently happened is that after 10 years of Austerity, 3 years Credit Crunch and
1 year in recession the economy has grown 0.6%.
The same Tories increased inflation to 11.1% so what kind of name could be used for something 19 fold greater than Gangbusters?
I think we should now agree that all politicians and bankers salaries should now be capped at Gangbusters 0.6%.
If they have any complaints about this, who are they going to call-
“Gangbuster”.
Chris I am glad you represented Swinney with the pencils in the pocket as a Janitor and not a caretaker. Not the keeper of the Great Scottish Seal but the keeper of SNP secrets. They will out in the end. Swinney won’t last 2 years. I give it 4 months after the Summer recess when the Greens realise they were stitched up with the Cass Report.
Robin McAlpine’s latest, change in the Greens..hmm, all very Pollyannaish from McAlpine if you ask me.
“The SNP has now structured itself in a way in which bluntly only a leader can change the party. The membership can’t cast any other vote that will lead to reform (they tried, it was ignored) which is why they were so keen to make sure the membership didn’t get to vote for the leader either.
Where I have some hope that major and significant change might be possible is in the Greens. It seems that more and more people are now highly aware that Patrick Harvie has been leading the party further and further up a rather niche cul-de-sac. No-one now seems to link the Greens to environmental issues except those who hate climate change action.
Changing the SNP doesn’t seem possible now, at least in any acceptable timeframe, but changing the Greens may be. And this reality means that an awful lot of things outside the party which weren’t possible may be possible now.”
https://robinmcalpine.org/what-is-possible-and-what-isnt/
Republic of Scotland says;
‘The Alba Party’s campaign conference will be held in Lochelly, Fife, next Saturday, May 18.’
Is that no’ Lochgelly ?
In Lochgelly?
That conference should be a belter… 🙂 .
John Swinney is BRILIANT!
He has captured Kate (and Ivan) and has them within the cage of centralised NewSNP Government responsibility.
Expect then to utter ScotGov inanities until the time they leave the Government.
The Greens, among others, don’t realise how BRILLIANT JS is, achieved without real political power. I ask you: what really is the Scottish “economy”?
PacMan
11 May, 2024 at 8:55 am
“She would have got a bit more respect if she defended her beliefs”
If her beliefs hinder her ambitions, she has other beliefs.
If ideas were commodities then that is all the SNP have left to punt – cheap tat and useless baubles, no matter how they try to dress it up. But like most other Western politicians, they are merely the props of a more sinister agenda.
The Eurovision Song Contest is anything but a song contest. Nil public points for the UK entry. Of course just a few years ago their act would have been regarded as lewd and ..Thank goodness that’s over for another year. Interesting the UK public gave Israel 12 points. Perhaps the contest gets to the places the BBC don’t get to.
There are several references to Dr Johnson further up this thread. Perhaps this one is equally, or even more, apposite.
James Boswell,who was considering remarriage, following an acrimonious and disadvantageous divorce some time before, asked counsel of his friend regarding his opinion of the likelihood of success of the proposed Union.
Johnson replied thus.
“Sir, I can conceive of nothing which better represents the triumph of hope over experience”
And that, my friends, is exactly where we are today, defined by a philosopher from 250 years ago.
@ Tinto Chiel: “Lochgelly…. a belter”.
One of my neighbours is the daughter or grand daughter of the Lochgelly tawse manufacturer! She mentions it with a horrified kind of glee!
On this blog above any other blog we analyse facts. Fact number 1. The UK entry in the Eurovision song contest got zero points in the public vote. Fact number 2 and unnamed country got 12 UK public votes. Reason to think?.
George from what I have read and the few glimpses I saw of the competitors , life has turned extremely strange. ‘Normality’ is buried .
Confused 1:09
The wind blows where it will. It’s blowing now, tens of miles off Scotland’s coasts.
The idea that the wind belongs to “us” is ludicrous.
You might as well charge visitors to Scotland for breathing, in fact, charge all of us a proportionate rate, based on our relative prosperity.
Then fine us an environmental levy for wasting the wind blowing outside our doors.
To be serious and constructive, if the wind and the profits from it belong to whoever puts the money together to harvest it, then the answer for Scotland was always obvious and still is – a government managed entity, owned entirely by the people of Scotland, paid for with a levy from our taxes, with all profits distributed back to the Scottish people, via lower energy prices, or targeted energy grants.
There’s still plenty of wind out there to harvest and plenty of demand for the energy that can be extracted. The profits will belong to the investors, not those idly sitting on the sidelines with their hands out.
George Ferguson
I’ve just been reading press reports of last night’s Eurotrash so-called singing competition.
Scotland can’t compete, praise be. Who says there are no upsides to our not being independent?
I trust the SNP & Green crew found delight in Gayvision last night.
By many accounts a diabolical incarnation of every libertarian sex meme they stand for, but not the liberation for which they ought to.
Ms Forbes, you really do need all our prayers, perhaps even exorcism by now.
Vade retro…..all you useful tools.
They’re bringing her into the tent so she can be controlled and neutralised. She differs on policy, but she’s really no different to the rest of them, as shown by a history of going along with the nonsense. When has she ever really stood up to them?
Her only virtue is that she was clearly better than Humza. But that’s a low bar and I don’t see a great leader. Anyhow, by the time the election comes around her silence will have marked her out as just another SNP drone picking up a Ministerial salary for doing as they’re told.
I’M A FREAKIN SOCIOPATH
https://archive.ph/SqO8a
But i make mega$$$$$, so that’s nice.
NB. the old Facebook site, now Meta, was where Islamic State ran a virtual slave market during its «liberation» mission. It was in Arabic so got away with it.
I’m half Zuck’s age but even i sense this guy is just an old style grooming predator.
The Scottish government (SNP) under Sturgeon and beyond has cost the taxpayer an absolute fortune one example is the five years late and hundreds of millions overbudget two ferries of which this has been revealed.
“TAXPAYERS have spent £3.5million paying the wages for crew on one of Scotland’s delayed ferries despite it not carrying a single passenger.
The Scottish Government hired 14 staff to work on the over budget and late MV Glen Sannox in 2022 when officials believed it was six months from completion.
But two years on, the crew have yet to work on the job they were hired to do and have been paid the huge sum in wages”
And its not just the the SNP that’s costing the taxpayers a fortune, the vile Greens are also wasting millions.
“A WASTE firm has pointed the finger at axed Green Party minister Lorna Slater for them suffering a £150million loss over the failed bottle recycling scheme.
Biffa has now launched an action against the Scottish Government to recoup the cash in the Court of Session and has named her in their legal claim.
The recycling firm is seeking compensation for the money they invested in the collapsed Deposit Return Scheme and the subsequent loss of profit.”
We really need to vote the SNP and Greens out at every election, they are utterly incompetent and obsessed with gender issues.
Vote Alba and the ISP.
Tommo @6.02pm.
Tommo.
See those inverted commas at the start and the end of the some of the paragraphs they mean that I didn’t type them, it means they are quotations from another source that I’ve cut and pasted in here.
Swinney has been bumping his gums a lot recently on eradicating child poverty, here’s something he could do, infact his party has promised to do it but it hasn’t yet.
Mind you Swinney promised to push for Scottish independence, even boasting that we could ditch this bucket of shit union in five years, yet one of his first acts after his SNP coronation was to dissolve the post of Minister for Independence.
Watch what Swinney and the SNP government does not what they say they’ll do.
Vote Alba and or ISP, get the SNP and vile Greens out of office at every election.
“Scotland’s most senior trade union official has called for John Swinney to start tackling child poverty by keeping his party’s promise on free school meals.
Scottish Trades Union Congress (STUC) leader Roz Foyer said without progress, Swinney won’t be able to eradicate child poverty which he said is the single most important aim of his government.
Currently, only P1 to 5 kids receive free lunches while the government has promised to offer them to P6s and 7s.”
No surprises here from Labour whose branch office in Scotland is just that a branch office of London Labour, even the Electoral Commission called Scottish Labour a (OIM) Optional Image Mark of London Labour.
“LABOUR have been accused of “parachuting in paper candidates” after a raft of their Scottish General Election picks were revealed to be brd south of the Border.
It comes after Wilma Brown – who had been selected to run for Labour in the party’s key target seat of Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath – was removed as a candidate following an outcry over “racist” social media posts.
In her place, Labour selected Melanie Ward, who lives in London.
The party’s candidate in Angus and Perthshire Glens is Elizabeth Carr-Ellis, who is a councillor more than 500 miles away in the city of Canterbury, in Kent.
And Labour’s candidate in Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross is Eva Kestner, who works as a councillor in Lewisham in London.
Further, Labour’s pick to run in Orkney and Shetland is Conor Savage, who lives in Edinburgh and previously stood in Bangor for Plaid Cymru.”
I’m no fan of Tommy Sheppard or the SNP but Sheppard’s years long attempt to get English governments to release the result of polls, polls conducted with taxpayers cash on what people actually think of the union has failed. English governments have spent significant amounts of taxpayers cash to stop Sheppard from finding out the results of the polls via engaging expensive lawyers.
One has to ask themselves why the English government took such drastic steps to hide the results of these polls. I think deep down we all know why.
@RepublicOfScotland 12:35
Do you think that might be why Yousaf added an extra penny on Scottish Income Tax, to fund the mismanagement and legal bills from SNP snafus?
Do you think Swinney should add another penny on to “eradicate child poverty”?
Taxpayer’s money grows on trees, right?
And the easiest and quickest route to national prosperity has always been to tax it into being.
@ Andy Ellis,
Left a comment/request for you btl previous article.
Hatey McHateface.
If you want good public services which most folk do then adding a bit onto tax is part of the way forward other countries do this.
Of course you can’t give half of your money and the majority of your assets to a foreign country and allow it to interfere/make/control in your own countries policies and expect to compete with countries that have ALL the levers of government and assets, basically Scotland is trying to compete with one hand tied behind its back as part of this rancid shithole union.
To make matters worse we currently (and since Sturgeon became FM and beyond) have had and still have incompetent SNP governments, of which one could quite easily assume that governing bad is part of their remit to make Scotland seem as unable to govern itself, then you have the colonial aspect which Alf Baird has explained to us in detail.
No independence is the only way forward the sooner Scots who don’t support this, realise this, the quicker we can move forward, to repairing and building a better country.
They say that a drowning man will clutch at a straw*. Not SNP MSPs though: they would rather go under. They have gazed at their party heading towards perdition for years now – primarily because it has abandoned independence – yet chose to do nothing about it.
We point the finger at the Murrells, the greens, civil servants, the inner circle, corruption, the policies and so on. However, it is the silence of nondescript backbenchers who hear nothing, see nothing, and criticise nothing that has sanctioned every calamitous action by this administration since Nov 2014. They must shoulder most of the blame.
All that has been required to stop the madness is for a small group of 8 SNP MSPs to band together and put their constituents, and the country, before that of the party machine.
They could have forced Sturgeon to take an aggressive stance on Indy in 2015, citing 56/59 MPs. They could have prevented the Salmond stitch-up. They could have pushed through Indy 2 after the Brexit result. They could have refused to deal with the greens. They could have put a stop to GRRB and HCB and many other divisive policies. They could have ensured sound administration of the available budget. But they did nothing.
These backbenchers are apparently too dumb to realise that the clamour for SNP list seats in 2026 will put them behind the entire Sturgeon clique, the woke brigade, AND the 40 WM MPs who are about to lose their seats, and that rebellion or defection would have given them a fighting chance (the straw*), either as independents or as part of an Indy party.
The tragedy of their acquiescence is that independence supporters had put SNP in an unstoppable course to gain control of HR without having to win a single list seat.
In doing so we would have sailed past the 50% threshold: –
Year / votes / % / seats
2003: 456K, 23.8%, 9 seats
2007: 660K, 32.9%, 21 seats
2011: 900K, 45.4%, 53 seats
2016: 1.06 million, 46.5%, 59 seats
2021: 1.29 million, 47.7%, 62 seats
2026: = 2023?
an article on bloomberg, this caught the eye :
“Despite being Africa’s largest oil producer, Nigeria imports most of its gasoline needs because it lacks the refining capacity to meet domestic demand.”
– but at least the nigerians subsidise fuel prices so the people can live (fuck you, Scots!), though they have currency problems and it looks like their reserves are going to be wiped out. Forex speculators and hedge funds, circling.
Point is : should be a rich country, isn’t. Wetin be dey implications?
Once we start IMPORTING “ENGLISH” OIL then we really will look like an economic basket case. GERS will reflect this.
I haven’t read too much on it, but the phenomenon of being an oil producer and yet having to devalue your currency is either – spectacular incompetence, or a lot of evil fuckery going on.
Likewise Zimbabwe, literally, a gold mine. Should have a very strong currency, but you need to have some sober person to monitor the money supply and exchange rates.
Having said that, the USA should have seen the dollar tank a long time ago, but it exports its economic sicknesses to other countries (forced to use the dollar), the inflation it should suffer. This is the imperial privilege of big fucking guns, carrier battle groups, nuke subs – a cheque kiting / extortion with menaces operation. Print up dollars, get people to hand you over real wealth for them; don’t try this scam yourself mind, even as colour printers are scary good these days.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LuceecQ-7Gk
-it’s all about the paper. The interviewer was a notorious mortgage fraudster, but his crimes were amateur hour compared to wall st; he went to jail though, this is why you go to harvard/yale. First 20 minutes is his sad childhood.
Scotland had its own counterfeit genius – “hologram sam” – owned a printing business, of working class, socialist background; partly saw his enterprise as a method to destabilise the british state; fight the man, and make a profit on it.
I like reading the telegraph, its a southern anglo tory bastard house rag, but when among themselves and alone, they talk candidly thinking no one is noticing
https://archive.is/ei0K8
I hope one day to see our youth fight a war to keep antarctica british, and this is nothing to do with anything, rather the principle of the thing, sovereignty and nvironmenalism, “save the penguins from pou-tine”; not entirely sure the “international community” see that vast territory as “british”. Maybe the tories can use it to ship the immigrants to, I mean its safe enough, penguins don’t bite, though there is the leopard seal menace. (The only real fears the english have is that someone other than them gets their hands on this jackpot. And do you think this “net zero” is anything other than a scam?)
– this has a shocker in every paragraph; I wonder who will pay for it all?
https://archive.is/oxOTg
NB for every estimate on a major project, you can multiply by 3 from the initial estimate; this one, since it will take so long, might easily hit a trillion.
hatey – I never mentioned windpower but since you bring it up I am going to stick a turbine in your back garden; the revenue will be mine since you don’t own the wind. Also, I have issued a fracking license for under your house as you don’t own the deep earth. What’s mine is mine and what’s yours is mine as well, better together? – and yet the anglo will prattle on about property rights when in his interest.
The public rejected the Eurovision song. With was being promoted by the singer Olly Alexander on BBC Blue Peter.
The song was a disgrace. In your face gay sex on television in a toilet.
Gay people are not like that. Most live normal monogamous lives. Once again the BBC trying to push their sick woke agenda for the alphabet people who don’t represent gays anywhere.
I’d like to further add. Good to see the Conversion therapy bill binned!
We need to send the 115 million bill from BIFFA to Lorna Slater for her failed Bottle Deposit Scheme.
Swinney is a disgrace to Scotland. Look at the mess we are in because of your party.
Very Jimmy Saville. The song was being promoted to kids on blue peter.
Comes as no surprise to me that the song finished last. Last place from the public.
The public are sick to death of woke ideology in our country.
It’s time to take back control from the people that hate our country. The wokies!
My apologies. Neil Gray the health secretary – wife beater look alike – has came out and defended the conversion therapy bill saying it’s going ahead.
Get to fuck! Get to fuck Neil Gray! Scotland’s health service going down the toilet pan with a clown like yourself in charge!
I see Peak Rail Fares to return to SNP RAIL! Don’t worry. Become an asylum seeker. And get a free bus pass instead! Roam across Scotland to evade the home office! And steal from town to town!
They’ll be no “rehabilitation” – Neil Gray’s words – for the SNP.
He’s giving Michael Matheson – Worst Dad of the Year – a run for his money.
Picking up where his failed health secretary and embezzler of public money left off.
Like Niel Gray’s children – I feel sorry for them! I hope he doesn’t try and convert them for big pharma! Do you? I don’t!
“David Hannah
The public rejected the Eurovision song. With was being promoted by the singer Olly Alexander on BBC Blue Peter.”
I heard on the radio that boos at the Eurovision Political Song Contest were drowned out by machines that were attached to speakers that gave off loud sound of applause and cheers, and that everyone from contestants to the public who managed to get into the the event in Malmo Sweden was searched upside down and inside out looking for any pro-Palestinian paraphernalia.
The usual suspects made it into the top four, I and U, the former isn’t even in Europe neither is Australia and they had a casting vote.
Scotland….not even in the superqueer Euro songfest, in spite of all that effort in the cause of gender ID.
If ever there was a WAKE UP & smell the reality of being of «no account».
I do not understand why Scotland is still stuck in yewkays slurry.
Laziness? Urgent knitting?
What really went on behind the scenes at last nights Eurovision Political Song Contest.
https://archive.is/gn0iv
@Confused 3:55
If you think you can protect the turbine you intend to build in my back garden, you go right ahead and build it.
My money says you can’t though, and once you’ve processed that, you should be able to scale up your lack of ability to follow through to the bigger picture.
I note you’ve ignored my point. The wind blows and the energy it brings belongs to those with the wit and drive to harness it. That could have been the Scottish people, and it still could. But we would have to invest, plan, sacrifice and work. Instead, you want others to invest, plan, sacrifice, work, and then give you a bonus for doing nothing.
The real world doesn’t work like that.
RepublicOfScotland 5:09
Glad to hear they were all thoroughly searched.
Nobody wants a repeat of what happened at the big music festival in October 2023.
“But we would have to invest, plan, sacrifice and work. Instead, you want others to invest, plan, sacrifice, work, and then give you a bonus for doing nothing.”
Can you point us to where the Anglo & their shareholders toiled & worked & more importantly who paid for it?
Take yer time..
@Republic of Scotland
“One has to ask themselves why the English government took such drastic steps to hide the results of these polls.”
More hiding.
http://qpol.qub.ac.uk/a-critical-response-to-plans-for-a-public-history-of-british-policy-in-northern-ireland-during-the-troubles/
Geri 7:09
Sit down, calm yourself, and brace for news that will tear your world apart.
Ready … be brave now …
Millions of Scots are shareholders. Directly, with shares in their own name.
Indirectly, with shares owned by the intermediaries that manage and pay their pensions and their savings plans.
You might actually have some of those shares working for you, making you a shareholder too. Now isn’t that amazing?
Cough splutter hack cough… A neigbour has just kindled up their coal fire and it feels like I may have just lost a decade of life due to heavy passive smoking.
It minded me of the recent proposed banning of woodburning stoves debacle so did a quick search on coal burning.
“Household Coal Scotland & Wales
On 1st May 2023, the ban on the sale of Traditional Household coal in England came into force, as part of the government’s Clean Air Strategy. However, Wales and Scotland have devolved powers on environmental matters, and as yet there is no ban on household coal in these nations.
If you live in England, you are no longer able to purchase Bituminous House Coal from our website. For alternatives, please see our range of Smokeless Coal.
If you live in Scotland or Wales, you are not affected by this ban; residents in Scotland and Wales can still purchase Household Coal for domestic use.”
So as you were, carry on reeking…
I read police scotland have announced a report will be issued shortly!!
My god after all this time!!!
What a useless bunch the senior ranks must be right enough.
I have all the time in the world for the policemen in the beat. The senior ranks however need a clear out in a big way.
A small organisation with a turn over of a few million and they are incapable of reporting after all this time.
Shug …
The CC interviewed on Sky News said she expected the report “to go to the Crown Office in a matter of weeks”.
Not sure I’d class that as “shortly’.
I see also Swinney is saying trans women are women. Why dont the sno state the obvious.
As defined by the Westminster sexual equality act trans women are women.
Right now, every time this nonsense is dragged up, it looks like the snp are driving it and not just delivering what Westminster require.
The SNP has a real ralle t fir missing an open goal.
I see Hatey McHateface/sensible dave or whatever bot name they are using is back with us
Most have been taken in by Fiscal conservative, trickle down, austerity driven, free market, Kate Forbes.
All because she quite rightly stood against identity politics.
That’s how rotally fucked up the Indy movement is at present.
Good to know we can still use coal, Dan (9.34am) and your comment also explains why retailers are now promoting the use of ‘coal’ made from crushed olive stones. You have to wonder about the environmental effects of importing olive stones in a dirty British coaster with a salt-caked smoke stack mind you.
“That’s how totally fucked up the Indy movement is at present.”
Indy movement isn’t fucked up.
The SNP and their obsession with the blue haired, biology denying zealots in the twitler youth wing are what’s fucked up.
The Indy movement are as bemused as the rest of us as to how the fuck you turn a 6 percent swing from victory to beong 6 decades from victory in such a short space of time.
SteepBrae @ 12.52.
That would be the one that’s, “Butting through the channel in the mad March days”, I guess.
Just as well our SNP devolved administration weren’t involved in the commisioning and construction of the coaster or those olive stones would be considerably late in delivery and well over budget, I fear.
“All because she quite rightly stood against identity politics.”
Did she even actually do that? When, exactly?
The very one, Sven (1.20pm). John Masefield had it sussed. Good point about construction & delivery!